Solidworks 2009 -2010 need HELP installing

[noser]

Hi,

Has anyone successfully installed solidworks on 500 clients without having to visit each machine and do it manually?

What would you say my options are, anyone used Ghost to deploy it, or an MSI?

Really struggling to come up with a solution for this one, so any suggestions are very much appreciated.

Noah

[maark]

Hi,
had problems with this - ended up doing a manual install but i have not so many machines to do as you.
If you get the administrative image to work then this is supposed to install run from a command - you could script this to run. I tried administrative images but gave up trhough lack of time - they would start to run but then fail.

[noser]

Thanks Maark for your reply, did you install the licence server? or just install as standalone.

[maark]

Installed the licence server with dongle on server - then have to put in server location when installing to client e.g. 25734@yourserver. Copied contents of DVD to a shared location so could run several installs at once.

[noser]

Out of interest, how many machines did you install it on? and what sort of spec is your licence server?

[maark]

Hi,
installed on 40 machines but got another 20 laptops to do.
Failry high spec rack server - runs all our shared apps on there.
I made administrative images ok but they would not work from the html link they tell you to run - never got round to contacting solidworks as i decided to just do manual install. The install is about 4GB and the update is another 2GB if you download it - apparently need fairly high spec stations but seems to run on ours ok which are not that good - though kids not started using it yet - just updating mandatory profile to include this.

[Mikka]

I have been successfully using the Admin Image creator since SW-2006.

SW-2008 was a pain. SolidWorks broke the tool.

SW-09 was a complete rewrite of the Admin tool and works pretty well. SW-2010 is supposed to be even better... but I haven't tried it yet.

The HTML link doesn't work on any network with any kind of security. I run the install from a BAT file.

@echo off
\\YourServer\Img-SW08-32\sldim\sldIM.exe /adminclient /new /source "\\YourServer\Img-SW08-32\AdminDirector.xml"
exit

You may want to include "Run As" if users don't have Admin Privileges.

The first time you run the install the users will have to run the BAT either with an email link or a logon script.

The Admin tool uses MSIs, MHTs, and XML to rollout and update the workstations.

You can copy and change the XML for different types of installations (Core, Pro, eDrawings... etc.)

The key lies in the network Shares.

You MUST Turn-Off the shares to the image on the server when you are doing updates... or shuffle the share name, either works

- Create your image anywhere (local workstation works) in a directory named as it will be on the network share (server?)... ie "img-SW08-32", "img-SW08-64".

- Start with the SP 0.0 from the SolidWorks CD every time. Make sure you add the current SP to the image as you create it. It always take a couple of hours in my experience.

- Create a NEW install for Major Version and an UPGRADE for Service Packs.

- Make sure you put Major Versions in separate directories under "C:\Program Files\" ie: "SolidWorks\2007\", "SolidWorks\2008", "SolidWorks\2009".

- I run a "preinstall.bat" from the XML to check for registry setting and make sure the AV is off, and uninstall old Major Versions.

- I run a "postinstall.bat" from the XML to install 3rd Party Document Control.

- Complete the image.

- Upload to the Server Share location

- Turn the share back on.

If this is a Service Pack it should have the same share name as the previous Service Pack. This will insure that the next time the User starts SolidWorks it will upgrade automagically.

Although I don't recommend it, you can also do the same thing with Major Versions. We prefer to keep the old version running side-by-side with the new.